Using ArcGIS simulation software, scientist Witold Fraczek at Esri modeled what would happen if the earth’s rotation slowed down and finally stopped spinning i.e., if the centrifugal force came down to zero what would Earth look like.

Among the rather startling possibilities are the days getting longer and longer as the earth spins down, eventually reaching the stage where each day lasts as long as 1 whole year. This is easy to arrive at, since once the Earth stops rotating, it will take one full revolution (1 year) around the sun before the same side would face the Sun again, thus beginning a new day. But the other effects can’t be explained so easily but thanks to ArcGIS, we have detailed simulations that map out how the Earth would look after it has stopped.

Canada doesn’t stand a chance

Gravity is maximum at the poles and the oceans would rush to the poles submerging the Arctic and the Antarctic along with vast portions of Siberia and North America, while the Ocean Floor of today will become new land. The resulting Earth will thus be one continous land mass – an ‘Equatorial Mega Continent’, with all the water at the poles, forming two massive ‘Global Oceans’.

One Continent to rule them all

Fraczek concludes the findings saying:

‘The slowdown of earth’s rotation will continue for 4 billion years—as long as we can imagine. The slowdown infinitesimally—but steadily—changes the globe’s geometry and makes it dynamic. The net result of these dynamic adjustments is that the earth is slowly becoming more and more like a sphere.’